In commercial bakeries and other commercial production lines, automated systems and processes are used to produce products, such as breads, rolls, buns, cookies, chocolates, frozen foods, dairy products, beverages, pharmaceuticals and the like, in large volumes and typically in a generally continuous manner. The pans within which such products are contained during the production process are usually displaced by conveyors to facilitate the movement of a large number of these pans from one location within the establishment to another. For example, one example of a typical commercial bread baking process is as follows: a pan is first conveyed to a make-up station in which the raw dough is loaded into the individual pans; the pan then travels to a proofing area in which the dough is allowed to rise; once the dough has risen, the pan is transported by conveyor into a oven in which the dough is baked so as to turn into bread; once the baked bread exits the oven, it is removed from the individual baking pans and allowed to cool before being packaged for shipment; and the baking pans are either returned to the first make-up station to be loaded with new dough or stored in a pan storage area until a new production order using these pans is required.
Such continuous production lines thus require a large number of these pans to be moved around, usually via conveyors. One handling process which is desirable in the displacement of such pans is the ability to invert the pans, i.e. turn them either upside down or right-side up. This can be useful for a variety of reasons, including to facilitate emptying the products from the pan, or to facilitate the storage and/or cleaning of the pans.
For example, it is preferable that when not in use or while they are waiting to be filled, re-used, cleaned or stored, etc., the pans be stacked one on top of the other such as to minimize the space occupied thereby. However, if the pans are stacked on top of each other in a right-side up direction (i.e. with the interior surfaces which receive the bread dough therein facing upwards), then at least the upper most pan is exposed to the environment for a period of time, thus risking that dirt or other unwanted material falls into the recesses of the pan. Further, when stacked on top of each other a right-side up direction, the load of a stacked pile of pans is transmitted through the more delicate inner surfaces of the pans rather than the more robust and reinforced edge regions, which is not the case when stacked in an upside down orientation. It can also be desirable to be able to invert the pans for a number of other reasons, such as to empty out the contents of the pan or to permit cleaning of the interior surfaces of the pan with the aid of gravity, air jets, brushes, etc.
The cleaning process in particular is much more easily accomplished when the pans are upside down. However, to be able to do this, the pans must first be turned upside down, cleaned, and then turned back right-side up before they can be re-used in the process assembly line. This process of inverting the pans twice can be quite time consuming with currently employed pan inverting systems, and in a continuous and high-volume production setting, any pan inverting system employed must be able to accommodate a very high throughput which is now required in most modern commercial bakeries, such as a throughput of 30 or more pans per minute.
Thus, while there have been various previous attempts to provide pan inverting systems, there are disadvantages associated with these known systems. Typically, these systems include some type of rotating drum or wheel, having a number of radially extending flaps or clamps on which pans are loaded, one pan per paddle or clamp on the rotating drum/wheel. Once one or more pans are loaded, the wheel is rotated thereby turning the pans end-over-end to turn them upside down, before being unloaded from the wheel. One disadvantage with these types of systems is that the pan loading and wheel rotation steps are discrete activities, and thus subsequent movement of the pans ceases until these steps are executed. These pan inverting systems, with their discrete movements and “flip” turning end-over-end motion of the pans, cannot be operated fast enough to invert the high volume numbers of pans required in most commercial bakeries today. Also, some of these systems subject the pans to free fall movement that is only broken by the pan striking a hard surface. This shock loading can, over time, weaken the pans and significantly reduce their useful lifetimes. This “flip” turning method of inverting the pans end-over-end using a paddle-wheel style system also tends to generate significant noise, created by each pan being flipped over and striking the exit surface or conveyor. Such noise is undesirable in a commercial bakery operating continuously for long periods of time.
Accordingly, an improved pan inverting system is desired.